Efficiency for Humanity’s Sake
part 1!
While being a perpetually curious person has its pitfalls (oh boy how rabbit holes can suck me under like quicksand), one of its best perks is that I can get struck by inspiration truly anywhere. One of these moments was in a very remote Berber village in the desert of Morocco, about an hour outside of Marrakech last fall. A rare look at a very private weaving collective was arranged by my guide Emma Lapin and her wonderful hospitality team at the magical hotel El Fenn.
While we were at the collective to admire the work of the women who made the most stunning pieces of art passed down by tradition by hand, I was most struck at the systems behind the scenes. The collectives renaissance was lead by Christian, a French businessman who had spent time as a child in the area with his mother. The village was falling on challenging times and work was hard to come by. Over the past few years he concocted a plan to give the women of the village meaningful work while still respecting the very traditional values that define their role in their household. He knew that the women in town needed opportunities to contribute, but if they were in traditional families, that role would always be a non-negotiable first priority. They couldn’t simply outsource childcare and cooking and home duties as we can. Not just because they didn’t have access to those resources like we do in the states, but deeper. That would be in direct conflict with their values. Understanding that using a time clock wasn’t going to be a reliable metric for compensation, Christian devised a new plan. The women could come in and begin their work after their children were off at school and household duties were at a pause for the day. Instead of reimbursing them by the hour, he reimbursed them by the centimeter of weaving. The more intricate the design, the higher rate per centimeter, and vice versa. They could start the work at the collective and bring it home to finish on their own timeline. No stressing over the clock. No fretting over calling in when a child is sick or getting childcare covered. But still being paid for the pieces of art they were crafting.
Watching the women in their traditional garments flood in in mid morning, some with younger children in tow, and sit in community with their neighbors chatting has sat with me for months.
How do we get back there? How to we keep creating efficient solutions for humanity’s sake.
It could have been easy (and most likely was for centuries!) to say there was no way for these women to have steady work and income. They had household duties, life happens when you are a caretaker, and the pressure expected hours at work adds so much stress. I’ve listened to manyyy a podcast, read newsletters, opinion pieces, books on how to make careers more inclusive of values and quality of life. Our current models of work simply aren’t designed for the complexities of being a full-time parent. We have talked about it in circles. Pondered. Hypothesized. Criticized. And yet, in the most unlikely of places in the desert of northern Africa, a better system was formed and thriving. The collective now consists of over 100 women.
To me, this is how the world’s changed. Not in huge voices of power and fame (thank God those illusions are dissolving.) But in these beautifully humane but brilliant decision and inflection points.
I was reminded of Christian and the weavers collective sitting in my car waiting for my daughter to wrap up dance class last Wednesday. Listening to the latest podcast by Elise Loehnen1 featuring Jennifer B. Wallace, whose book Mattering: The Secret to a Life of Deep Connection and Purpose shares stories and provides frameworks on the power of being on the giving and receiving side of making someone feel like they matter. By devising this new system, Christian created a way to show the women in the village that they matter. Not loudly, not with pomp. I actually couldn’t find a trace of this work online when I was trying to fact check my limited pieces of information about the organization.
One of the biggest blessings of my life, and I believe one of the most impactful, was raised by a master matterer. My mother is the living embodiment of empathy in action. She has spent her entire adult life in pursuit of making sure individuals with different abilities have places to know that they matter. A fierce, and I do mean fierce, advocate for the Department of Special Education in the complicated-at-best state of Louisiana. She brings her view that every person matters into everything she touches even in one of the most challenging school systems in the country. (ILY mom!!)
While I couldn’t be more grateful to have spent my entire life with a front row ticket to such a mattering master class, I’ve always been a bit disappointed that my work on the outside world was in the realm of commerce. Even though I have been enamored with the art of exchange and curation since my first retail job in college, it’s always felt a bit like playing for the wrong team. The frivolous side of life. That my chosen vocation realm couldn’t make an impact outside of on the surface.
Pairing my new point of view borrowed from Morocco with the stories of mattering, I felt the puzzle piece click into place.
For the past three years, I’ve been entrenched in learning about the impacts of commerce on the collective and ways to improve it. A culmination of this study has been the positive trickle-down effects of empowering better stewards of commerce. They check all of my purpose-driven boxes: foster community, local workforce fortification, better environmental outcomes, quality-of-life employment. Morocco gave me the final piece to keep going in this work, especially when that annoying voice of doubt creeps up. “This work doesn’t matter. Your better commerce systems are like throwing a tiny pebble at a huge mountain of bedrocks that our current consumer frameworks are built on.” You get it. Pushing past that voice led me to building my very first app (!!!!) a software system aimed at tackling time-draining tasks that hold independent shop owners back from growth. A smart assistant trained on how retailers actually work, not just a light version of enterprise software that feels more like it says “be like us” than “be like you.”
It’s been quite the journey, and one I hope is the first step to say to a wide variety of different people that they matter and creating new ways to organize work to help support them.
Right now, I see a lot of people asking how we can build a better world. One that isn’t solely dependent on those who can yell the loudest, exploit the most systems while having the strongest muscle to shove down their morals and humanity on their quest for importance at. all. costs. For me, I’ve been staying laser-focused on what I can control, no matter how simple and unglamorous it may seem. Helping find ways to make my corner of the world feel like it matters.
Now that my brainchild is finally being released to the world, I am so looking forward to sharing more of the people, perspectives, and experiences that have led me to this place in life. My hope is, at most, an invitation to think differently about how you can contribute and, at least, paying it forward to the voices that helped shape me — to say thank you for them lending their points of view. Over the next few weeks and months, I’ll be sharing more of these stories and I look forward to the conversations that ensue!
*Elise’s podcast and Substack have served as an external processing system for me for years — untangling outdated views and bringing in stronger ways of viewing life and our roles in it. Not by forcing thought systems as dogma but as outlet to think differently. Consider this my insistence invitation to follow her work, especially right now. Her words lately have been an extra strong gift for these times!!